Student Shot at Calif. High School; Suspect Held

A student was shot and wounded at a rural California high school Thursday and a student suspect was taken into custody, officials said. The shooting occurred about 9 a.m. at Taft Union High School, a community of fewer than 10,000 people amid oil and natural gas production fields about 120 miles northwest of Los Angeles. A shotgun was used in the attack, officials said.

The teen victim was in critical but stable condition, Kern County Sheriff Donny Youngblood told a press conference. The sheriff said the teacher suffered a minor pellet wound to the head but declined treatment.

When the shots were fired, the teacher began trying to get the more than two dozen students out a back door and also engaged the shooter in conversation to distract him, Youngblood said. A campus supervisor responding to a call of shots fired also began talking to him.